#that's the best way to avoid replicating it tbh

[rexwrendraws]

How did you get the old style printer effects on the BitB flyers? Did you use Photoshop? ❤️

Yes I did use Photoshop! The printed effects are a combination of a few things: (original post here)

The easiest thing to do is to use Photoshop's default Filter Gallery, I usually use this as a starting point when editing. The filters I like also tend to flatten the image, which I don't usually mind unless the image starts getting unrecognisable/unreadable or loses depth in places where it needs it. For example, in the pic of Mason above, the shadow where the jaw meets the neck gets lost with the Halftone Pattern filter (it becomes hard to read)— to solve this, I used the Conté Crayon filter on a different layer underneath the halftone so that the shadow is still visible while maintaining the graphic qualities I like.

The other easiest thing to do is to avoid using pure whites and blacks anywhere. For this I recommend looking at what kind of printing you're trying to replicate digitally because it differs based on printing material. I also think it's worth seeing if you can actually, physically print and scan it back as a digital file to further edit because nothing beats the real effect.

The left image is the digital files, and the right image is the same files printed (literally an office printer) and scanned back. The file with the white background scanned back in slightly grey/toned, which is what I tried to replicate in my original toned background digital file. Both printed/scanned versions interact with color overlays differently. It's a lot of trail and error, general experimentation lol.

On top of this, I like adding texture overlays! They're my best friend! Indieground has some fantastic freebies which I use a lot (especially the Photocopy Noise and Abstract ones), and Resourceboy's textures (especially his White Paper Textures, they've saved my life many times) are also excellent. For the BitB flyer, I added photocopy scanner textures before I printed it. I've used the white paper textures on this Daniel Hall artwork and the Horse Girl AU Poster.

Picking and adding color also depends on what kind of print style you're trying to replicate. The BitB flyer is trying emulate xerox flyers across both grunge and punk eras, so I wanted it to look like it was printed on colored paper of some kind.

These colors were added as adjustment layers above everything else. I think each color was at a different layer type though, I was purposefully avoiding anything that flattened the 'ink' and textures or made anything too pure black. I try to limit color when imitating xerox printing to one ink color and one paper color, but it's up to your personal tastes tbh.

Honestly, there's no one way to do it! It's always a lot of experimentation and feeling it out. This is just my general though process but hope it helps in whichever way you needed!

[shrinkthisviolet]

for my new ask game!

3, 8, 16, 18, 21, 33, 40, and 50

3. Have you ever written a soulmate AU? If you haven't, why would/wouldn't you write one?

I have this series! I wanted to take the soulmate AU and make it something more choice-based, more in line with “If soulmates do exist, they’re not found. They’re made. People meet, they get a good feeling, and then they get to work building a relationship.” It’s the best take on soulmates I’ve ever seen, and it’s the kind I tried to replicate in that series! Idk if it’ll ever get updated, but I do wanna use that worldbuilding for something else one day.

8. Have you ever written any friendships that could've easily become romantic relationships? How did you navigate it?

I have! Honestly, there are plenty of those. I just navigate it by writing what feels true to me—do I want to pursue a ship with them? What would it add to this fic, if anything? What does it add if I keep them as friends? What tropes does it subvert, one way or the other (obviously this in itself is not a reason, it’s just an additional consideration)

For example: there’s a ship in an upcoming fic that I definitely didn’t plan initially, but which I think adds a lot of weight overall. It drives both characters in interesting ways but never detracts from their character arcs—neither of them have to give up anything for the other, and neither would ever ask that of the other.

(…actually there’s two ships like that 😅 in different fics, but still)

16. Are there any relationship dynamics/tropes you enjoy reading about, but wouldn't want to write yourself? Vice versa?

I’ve read a few “love triangles” but I’d never write one. But that’s also a trope I try to avoid whenever possible anyway, because they’re usually love corners/angles, not true triangles. And it’s usually sexist af, because in this trope, the “triangle” is never really about the girl at the center, it’s always about the guys fighting for her.

18. Pick a few characters you've written for (or, for a fun twist, asker chooses). Tell me about their relationship in three sentences or less.

Hmm…Mai, Aang, and Katara.

Mai and Aang: absolutely the opposites attract besties. No one expects them to get along as well as they do, but Mai finds Aang endearing in an odd way (he reminds her of Ty Lee), and Aang thinks she’s really cool, especially her sharp aim.

Mai and Katara: they aren’t sure what to make of each other at first, especially since their first meeting was them fighting each other. Really, it’s Aang who gets them to have a conversation after all of that—he just wants the two coolest people he knows to be friends. And it works! Mai and Katara hit it off splendidly once they get past the awkwardness.

Kataang: self-explanatory: they’re a badass power couple and I love them 🥰

21. Not all relationships are romantic. What's your favorite non-romantic relationship that you've written about?

Currently, Barry & Morgan 💞 I didn’t actually intend them to be as prominent to the AU as they are now — I loved them in s2, but writing the s1 arc just kicked that love into overdrive. They’re so, so special to me and I love them so much 🥹

33. Are there any canon romantic couples, in any media, that you just can't stand?

Reylo for sure, Spallen (do they count if they were only briefly canon?), Hawkmoon, Yasmetri, Quickwest (again, briefly canon), Toriguel, Samrobby

(Obviously this is not a judgment on the shippers, but…yeah, I’m not a fan of these ships 😅 there are others that I tolerate sometimes, but those aren’t on this list. Tbh I might even be forgetting some, but that’s most of them at least)

40. Pick a relationship (not necessarily romantic). What tropes apply to this relationship? What tropes does this relationship subvert?

Morgan and James! They’re Lovers to Exes (subverting the common Exes to Lovers trope)…and they’re also Exes to Friends. And ofc James is her Guy in the Chair—even after she joins Team Flash, he’s still there when she needs him (and vice versa ofc…granted he doesn’t have powers, but she’s still going to be there for him as much as he lets her)

50. Free space! Brag on yourself! Advertise your writing! What are you most proud of recently?

Currently, I’m super proud of the first Childhood Friends AU fic I posted! And my first Izumi & Zuko fic 💞

fanfic relationships ask game!

[theghostofashton]

.

[100hearteyes]

Here is my (very disorganized) analysis of Bienvenidos a Edén/Welcome to Eden. I usually avoid getting spoilery in these but this time it's unavoidable. I'll try to keep it to things either shown or implied in the first two episodes.

First things first, if you're watching BaE and suddenly wonder like, "wait, I feel like I've seen this before" – it's because you have. It's called The Wilds and it streams on Prime. The premise and a lot of the mechanics are pretty much the same. That said, BaE manages to keep it interesting (though not as well written) and inserts some verrrry pleasant variables.

Such as the very, very, very spoilery thing I shall yell about in the last paragraph of this analysis.

On the other hand, the story itself is paper-thin and some characters are either caricatures or badly built/written, and the writing stumbles on its own big brain-ness a couple of times.

I find it funny how Netflix Spanish shows always have an Argentinean actor (Alta Mar, Sky Rojo – Wendy ❤️ –, Élite, La Casa de Papel).

I managed to start and end BaE unspoiled and am very glad. Tbh I came for Bel's abs (I called her Abs at first) and the horses, stayed for a lot of other things. The first couple of episodes – first one especially – are the hardest ones to get through, but I genuinely think BaE is worth a watch: it has a diverse cast, the big baddie is a total MILF (we love evil women in this house); some characters are lovely – when Maika, Charly, or Bel smile, you smile; the love between the sisters, Zoa and Gaby, is beautiful to watch, even when they're apart; and the mystery surrounding Edén is intriguing.

The way they portray environmental awareness is dodgy at best. I get what they're trying to do: replicate The Wilds's Gretchen – "yeah she's evil, but is she wrong?". The thing is, as loath as I am to say this, there is a difference between putting kids in mortal danger to prove a point and actually killing them – even worse, having the kids you trust kill the ones who rebel, and making it part of a reward system. So when it's Erik and Astrid saying those things, it's worse. Also, Gretchen's is more the crazy, psychotic type than Astrid, who is calm, cold, analytical. Those things as well as its insulation from the main plot play a part in making BaE's portrayal of environmental awareness dodgier than the feminism in The Wilds, which weaves it directly into the character-oriented story it tells.

I like how BaE subverts some character expectations – Nico at the center of this –, but would oh so appreciate it if África stopped making googly eyes at Edén Dad. Bel is by far my favorite character, and not just for the abs or being a lesbian – yes, she has her flaws, and SPOILERS her recklessness has led to tragedy (she told Fran to wait though!), SPOILER OVER but she's selfless and compassionate and she is trying to effect lasting change, but still finds it in herself to pause her plans and help others.

Oh also I just realized Begoña Vargas (Bel) is also Verónica from Alta Mar and now that I've seen her freckles I need them to never be hidden again. Her freckles are beautiful.

Also love Zoa, Maika, Eloy, and Charly.

There is a surprising amount of mlm/wlw solidarity, even if I think it's not intentional. And you can really see the bond between some characters (Bel and Eloy, Maika and Charly, Zoa and Gaby, Cláudia and Fran, Astrid and Erik).

And also, HORSES. SO MANY HORSES. The horse lover in me was LOVING THE HORSES.

Despite the issues I really look forward to the second season, because I can't not know what happens next and I love some of the characters. However, I don't see this show having enough of a story to run for more than two seasons.

And finally, where this gets really spoilery.

SPOILERS BELOW

.

.

.

THE LESBIAN ACTIVITY 🙌❤️

For me it's the way it started out as Bel having an apparent straight girl crush and then she and Zoa actually became the main couple ❤️

And Nico being manipulative at first but actually liking Zoa but then turning out to be an irredeemable psycho? Fuck. Yes. This isn't a love triangle, my dudes. It's a lesbian romance with an evil psycho trying to get in the way.

And also- QUEER WOMEN STAY WINNING 🙌

That said, I fear the season finale painted a target on either Bel or Eloy (or both)'s back. I really really hope neither of them, least of all Bel, dies. I really hope the writers see Bel as key for the revolution and don't kill her 🥺 I think she's more useful alive than as a martyr.

[tiesthatbind-tf]

I accidentally deleted 2000 words of story for poor Soundwave last night and had to rewrite everything but tbh, they’re absolutely worthit.  Their armor definitely makes me want to experiment with Celtic motifs for Hot Rod!

Full story below.

Suraya Widodo was born to parents Wijaya and Ni Made Saraswati on the island of Madura, Indonesia. They noticed that something didn’t quite seem right with their baby, who was fussier than most, threw fits when brought into crowded spaces and seemed mostly lost in their own thoughts, though this did little to dampen their love.

The name ‘Widodo’ (healthy) was given to Suraya (despite the masculine nature of it, which does lend to Suraya’s nonchalance about their gender in later years) in hopes that they would grow up alright despite their quirks.

Wijaya, a fisherman who wanted to give his family a better life in the more industrialized town of Bangkalan west of the island, pushed himself hard at his work, hoping to earn enough to allow them to settle down there comfortably.

He began to risk venturing out into ocean areas which were occasionally used as smuggling routes where more lucrative catches laid, careful to fish there during specific times to the day to avoid crossing paths with pirates and smugglers.

However, his luck ran out one day when a smuggling vessel came across him in broad daylight and silenced him from alerting the coast guards to their existence with five shots.

Suraya was five.

Saraswati, desperate to find a way to care for her child as the new breadwinner thought she had gotten lucky when a job scouter for a factory in Bangkalan came to the village. They were looking to offer work to single mothers as part of their corporate responsibility programme and extended the offer of employment to her and promised a hostel and training so she wasn’t out of her depth in the assembly line.

Seeing it as the best option, she left Suraya with her husband’s family while she worked and lived in a worker’s hostel on weekdays and returned to see Suraya every weekend.

She would give money to the family to care for Suraya in her absence, which was crucial since they weren’t fond of Saraswati (they had not agreed to Wijaya’s marriage) and found Suraya’s odd behavior off-putting and claims of ‘hearing voices’ potentially a sign of mental illness (which was fodder for them to demand even more money from Saraswati with the excuse that Suraya was a handful).

This routine continued until Saraswati was suddenly killed in a factory accident.

Suraya was nine.

The compensation for Saraswati’s death was enough for the family for only a few months and after it dried up, the neglect and abuse began. Though at times it was odd because Suraya seemed to know when they were in a bad mood and when they were looking for an outlet for their anger, and  the child would somehow almost always magically disappear during those times.

Then an agent claiming to be from the government came to see them.

He claimed he had heard about Suraya via their mother and wanted to inspect the child to see if they would qualify for a place in a ‘special school’ for ‘different’ children, and this had sounded tame enough to the family, who allowed him to see the shy, withdrawn little waif.

However Suraya immediately could tell what his true intentions were—-to have them locked up in a testing facility to figure out their ‘mutation’—-and attempted to run, only to be caught by his fellow officers outside the home.

The family was paid compensation for officially relinquishing Suraya’s care to the state, and did so without question, only relieved to be rid of their ‘burden’.

Suraya was taken to facility after facility in the state for the first few years to have a battery of tests, many painful, run on them to figure out their ‘special ability’ as an Outlier and to see if it could be replicated.

When they were in their early teens, they were transported overseas to a different facility as a bargaining chip for intel, tech and the like, coming into the ‘care’ of people who intended to use them as a government asset.

They never saw daylight except during transportation and they began to plan their escape as they studied the facility’s layout.

Their first attempt at escape didn’t go well however; they were caught, dragged back and had their eyes burned and blinded as punishment (at this point they had shown their handlers that their highly-enhanced hearing made them capable of navigating the world in total darkness, so said handlers didn’t not see this as ‘damaging the goods’).

If the handlers thought that the punishment would deter them however, it didn’t; Suraya just became more careful and subtle with the planning of their next attempt.

The second attempt came during a transport session where there were less guards and less access to tech to subdue them, though it came with a problem they did not plan for.

In their first attempt, they had tried escaping into the countryside. In this one, they hurled themselves out completely unprepared into a world louder than any world they had ever known; downtown London on a weekend.

The cacophony completely overwhelmed their senses and they barely managed to crawl-stumble into an alley as bounty hunters were enlisted to track them down.

It was here that they ran into one Ramiro Vasquez (Ravage) who was immediately concerned about their situation and once figuring out the nature of their distress, gave them his headphones to drown out the noise and kept them safe and hidden until the bounty hunters had left.

He then took Suraya back to the rented apartment he shared with Lara Soelberg (Laserbeak) and both agreed to let the waif stay with them for as long as they needed to be alright, and the three formed a little familial unit as Suraya grew deeply fond of the two Beast Men whom they saw as two of the most compassionate people in a horrible world.

Ramiro however understood that Suraya needed tutelage to properly harness and deal with their Outlier ability; having heard whispers of a secret Outlier school run Senator Sharifuddin Waseem (Shockwave) and knowing Sharifuddin as one of the few good men in the Senate, he decided to take the risk and confronted the Senator about the matter, promising to keep the secret a secret in return for helping out Suraya.

As it turned out the threats were not necessary, as Sharifuddin was genuinely  concerned for them and came to see them personally at the apartment. Initially,  Suraya was apprehensive about meeting someone else about their abilities, remembering full well how the first such meeting ended, but to their pleasant surprise, they detected no malice in Sharifuddin’s intentions; only the desire to help.

They agreed to enroll in Sharifuddin’s Outlier institute, coming back home to see Ramiro and Lara every weekend.

They excelled in their classes and soon mastered their ability and knew how to deal with the overstimulation that came from it, to the point where they could walk the streets with no problem.

In the wake of murders of Senators Nikomedes Momus and Gayathri Sharma, Suraya offered to become a spy for Sharifuddin, who was determined to solve the deaths, and Sharifuddin began bringing them to Senate meetings under the guise of them being his new aide.

They caught the eye of Senator Radbourne (RatBat) who seemed to pick up the fact that they were an Outlier, but rather than bring up the matter, requested that they work with him as well on.... matters regarding his constituents with disabilities.

Sharifuddin has his reservations about Radbourne and Suraya knew they were up to no good and both agreed to the arrangement so Suraya could dig up more information about them.

As it turned out, Radbourne was dirty as dirty as politicians came, but he had nothing to do with the murders. Rather, he was mostly preoccupied with an individual named Morgan Trayton (Megatron), the same individual whom Omar Parvez (Orion Pax)  a friend of Sharifuddin’s, had mentioned as a great writer.

Radbourne asked Suraya to track down Morgan with an offer the man hopefully wouldn’t refuse and Suraya, intrigued about this man with what they’d heard about him from Omar, agreed to do so.

They found Morgan in a vast underground fighting ring in Moscow, and after voicing some skepticism about him walking his written talk, he allowed them to peek into his mind to see how genuine and committed he was to his cause, and it took them aback for a bit to meet someone who despite being mired in tragedy, had Sharifuddin’s desire to make a better world and the iron will to back it up.

They pledged themself to be among the first members of Morgan’s rising revolution (which was aided by Omar spreading his writings through an underground press) and told them about Radbourne’s offer to supply weapons and augmentations to increase profits from the pitfighting racket.

Morgan agreed if only to use these exact items against the Senate once he’d acquired an army.

It was during this time with Morgan that they also met Ramsey (Rumble) and Friedel (Frenzy), a pair of dwarf miners who the man had been friends with for years, and almost immediately got along with their boisterous, gregarious natures. 

They continued to be Radbourne’s liaison with Megatron until the start of the Clampdown when they watched Morgan kill the owner of the Pit, free those who wanted their freedom and take those who were loyal to him to meet with Sharifuddin to formally establish a rebellion.

It was about this time that Suraya found out that Radbourne had been conducting illegal experiments on Beast Men, something they took grave offense to, and they kept mining Radbourne for more information about where the experiments were taking place.

Upon finding out, they personally hunted down Radbourne as Stefan Scavarro (Starscream) initiated the Senate massacre to Radbourne’s labs, where he tried to fight them off only to finally find out the true extent of their abilities.

Badly-injured, his attempt at stopping them from freeing the captive Beast Men—-his “property” as he would yell at them—-ended up with him hurled into a genetic splicing pod (commissioned from a ‘Mesothulas’) which he accidentally activated.

The process twisted him into a Rat-Bat-human hybrid, and rather than kill him, Suraya decided to leave the option to the Beast Men he tortured for profit in what they saw as poetic justice.

After those who wanted vengeance were done with Radbourne, Suraya gave the  Beast Men the option of leaving free or coming with them to be a part of Morgan’s revolution which would ensure that they were never mistreated and ostracized by the larger world again.

Two of the Beast Men took up the offer; Bastien Saville (Buzzsaw) and Gan Go-eun (Glit).

When Morgan, confident in Suraya’s abilities asked them  to establish their own division focussed on spying and intel gathering, Suraya chose Ramiro, Lara, Ramsey, Friedel and Bastien to work alongside them.

While Suraya occasionally questions Morgan’s actions, two things they have never questioned are his dedication to his cause and the compassion he shows to those they care for, and it’s enough for them to consider themself a true Decepticon till the day his objectives are achieved.

[elfyourmother]

TBH as a G'raha stan who also likes everyone else and enjoys lurking here, thank you for just kind of talking around him. I know he's not everyone's cup of tea - and also that his popularity both in- and out-of-game are probably grating to those who dislike him - but people who dislike him can also be weirdly vicious about it. I notice and apperciate your "I will just ignore his existence the best I can" approach.

np, ultimately I would much rather focus on the characters and things that I love. tbh I just feel like it’s healthier but also my whole thing is like…what kind of space do I want to cultivate? one of the main reasons I fucked off from dr*gon age forever ago was because of just how toxic the fandom was, folk just wallowing in hate all the time and pointlessly nasty about the most inconsequential things for like no reason. even when I agreed w people it was just exhausting and I’ve been pretty determined to not replicate that kind of misery anywhere else

I do my best to tag so folk can avoid it when I do rant or talk shit about stuff to vent when I need to, but I just feel like it’s way more fun to squee at the end of the day

[meruz]

Hey I can't find this in your FAQ so sorry if it's been asked before! Your traditional art is so stunning and vibrant, would you happen to have any brand recommendations for people trying to get into painting? Maybe specific gouche paint, brushes, papers etc. Thank you so much and have a nice day!

no one has ever asked me this before because this is like the first time ive started putting traditional art on my blog! LOL umm to be honest I’m very far from pro on this front, most of my knowledge comes from a handful of classes I didn’t pay a lot of attention to and lots of youtube videos but here’s my recommendations:

Paint

A lot of my paints are winsor newton designer’s gouache because this is what my teachers made me buy when I was a freshman at art school LOL. it’s definitely kind of pricey, I think it’s like $10.99 for a tube which I was NOT a fan of as a college student and is still not my favorite thing now. But they’re overall worth the price if you really want solid, high quality opaque paints. Though I’ve heard their student grade winton paints are decent as well?

I’ve heard less good things about brands like reeves and artist loft... but I think turner is alright? m.graham is supposedly great.

I also bought a set of holbein acryla gouache when it was discounted on amazon a while ago and have found it very solid. One thing you have to know about acryla gouache is that it uses a binder more like acrylic paint (hence the name acryla). Paints are made out of pigment + binder and most gouache is essentially watercolor but with extra pigment/chalk to make it opaque - the binder is water soluble so these paints can be reactivated with water. Acryla gouache is NOT water soluble when dry and it dries pretty fast so it’s overall less flexible. But other than that you can pretty much treat it like any other gouache and I find they keep a little better too, less likely to get gunky or stiff.

All paint brands have a handful of starter packs which are slightly discounted but if you want to build your own starting palette I’d say get a warm and cool tint of all the primaries, get a lot of white (working with gouache somehow involves a lot of mixing with white lol), and get a brown, maybe like burnt sienna or raw umber for underpaintings. No need to get a black, mixing darks builds character, looks better, and having one out of the tube can become a crutch. If you find a white watercolor paint tube that’s cheaper you can buy that instead of a gouache white. Again, they have pretty much the same make-up. And white paints are generally opaque enough that the composition between gouache/watercolor shouldn’t matter too much.

I’ve never used a block tray of gouache. Like those paints that come in little blocks in a tray? I know there's a bunch out there but I’ve never used them and I don’t know anyone else who does so I have no opinion on them.

Brushes

I’ve been kind of exploring this myself. I recently bought a cheap set of flat brushes off amazon LOL and I like them a lot?

Theyre probably not The Best or anything but I found flat brushes suit gouache plein air painting really well because its suits the kind of color blocking shapes I want to make. Also these had the right handle length to fit in my painting bag. That’s like the main reason I chose them tbh.

Honestly a lot of my art supplies philosophy is “give it a whirl with whatever you have lying around and when it feels like you're missing something specific keep an eye out for when that stuff goes on sale”

Paper

GOTTA BE HONEST I’m using cheapo paper. Because I’m making these paintings half for study and half to give my parents something to hang in the living room.

You can actually see some of them curling in on themselves here lol. If you’ve seen the sketchbook I’m holding in any of my pics of paintings it’s one of the canson mixed media books.

and its FINE... I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it lol.. I like that the texture is very fine but it doesn’t hold a lot of water and definitely distorts. Also I keep ripping off the surface with painters tape but that might just be on me. Oh buy artist tape. Just because its so satisfying to have clean edges.

I’m using painters tape instead of artist tape because I found it in the basement but if youre buying supplies buy artist tape because it’ll be kinder to your paper. 

SPEAKING OF PAPER.

I guess anything heavyweight for watercolor/mixed media will be fine? some people like a lot of texture but if you’re painting small you might want to avoid it and pick hot press over cold press. Honestly I feel like a lot of this is going to depend on what your specific needs are.. how big do you want the paper to be.. do you want a sketchbook or would you rather carry around loose paper... etc. Maybe go to an art store and touch all their paper. I feel like its easier to understand sizes and texture when you’re seeing it physically.

When I go on a trip, I normally bring a softcover heavyweight stillman & birn sketchbook because I tend to obliterate metal spiral books in my bag LOL. Also I don’t rip any pages out of my travel sketchbooks so I don’t need perforation or anything. Also they go on sale a lot in the art store I go to haha. I havent used gouache extensively in it but it takes inkwash/maker pretty well.

On the higher end, I personally haven’t used it that much but my friends who do traditional illustration professionally swear by arches watercolor paper. It comes in lots of different sizes.

Whatever you use, if you really want it to lie flat you’re gonna want to soak and stretch it on a board but I don’t bother with that because I am lazy.

Palette

You didn’t ask about palette but I’m taking the opportunity to be a shill because I personally use a sta-wet palette and I LOVE it.

One of the biggest frustrations about gouache for me was how quickly it dries after it leaves the tube. And even if you can reawaken it with water its not quite the same? and consistency is SO important when it comes to applying gouache so I don’t want to be over-watering my paint.. ugh. Anyways, I don’t have to worry about that with the sta-wet palette and really its been a game changer for me. sta-wet is a brand name but there are a bunch of other wet palettes not by masterson that I’m sure are just as good. I mean, it’s just a box with a sponge basically, that can’t be hard to replicate.

The only thing - and I personally have not had this issue but I have friends who have - is that if you leave it wet for too long it could grow mold? or a mouldy smell? Just wash your palette with soap and don’t leave it for weeks on end and it should be fine.

If you’re not feeling a palette that’s always moist, the best palette I used in school was a simple glass palette. you can buy one I guess but it’s so easy to DIY, I think the way we did it in school is getting a piece of glass and mdf from the hardware store cut the same size and then duct taped them together on the sides so it wouldn’t be sharp.

costs like nothing.

what else...get a palette knife if you like to mix paints? and like to save paints... mixing with the brush means you lose paint in your brush in the mixing process so a knife is a good way to maximize that process. I don’t use it much but sometime if I have to mix a lot of one color I’ll pull it out of my bag.

I don’t know anything about easels, I sit on the dirty ground like a gremlin when I paint.

Ok yeah that’s all the supplies tips I have. hope some of it was helpful! always try to save money with art supplies, I think. Especially if you’re just starting out - it’s less stressful to use cheap supplies too lol. Good luck! Happy painting!

[bluealmondpie]

haikyuu!boyfriends~

and i am back with the pretty setter squad! it took me a long time to decide which character and then after that i had to fumble over how corrupted or innocent i wanted him to be. i ended up choosing innocent bc fluff. maybe i'll write the not so safe for work(?) stuff another time. (^_^;)

bf!tobio-chan

* shy boi. head empty only volleyball so is understandably confused about his reactions to you.

* what are these new feelings? he just has no clue. what even is love? does he even know what romance is??? what is a date?

* wants to spend time with you but doesn't know how to say it... awkward bean he is

* probably asks if u wanna play volleyball with him HAHAHAHA will want to teach you also. u know how mika got pissed at daishou? same feels

* hinata best wingman tbh

* hinata and sugawara best wingmen. first two to notice the feelings and totally helped set you guys up with lots of *wink wink hint hint* (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧ (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

* anyway when he finally realises he likes u he is a red, blubbering mess.

* what is a date? 可以吃的吗? (is it something to eat?) LOLOLOL

* anyway hinata at least got the point through to him that he should bring u to eat during a date and so..... he brought you two to a speciality milk shop smh

* ok the yogurts were good give him some credit

* anyway most of your dates r either food dates or wanna-come-watch-game-tape-with-me type of dates omg this boy. just what even is love only volleyball

* u will b bored. mika/daishou vibes

* travels around a lot for pro vb matches so be prepared for late night video calls and super early good morning texts (who tf wakes up at 430am kags pls. just bc hinata wakes up at 5am, u don't need to one up him for everything)

* he doesn't really care if u come to his matches or not. bc you will both end up watching the game tape at his apartment. it's not a choice he will watch it with or without u

* he will obsess over the details and replay all the bits he wants to see. will nudge u or narrate the good points and the bad points. minimally just nod in response

* not especially cuddly but when you're watching game tape tgt he likes it when you sit between his legs

* like will set his chin on your head and just watch the match and b engrossed it in while drinking milk (STILL? baby you're old enough to do power curry advertisements). he'll be really quiet tho (focused!!)

* basically u are a giant pillow when he is watching tv. occasionally will even hook his legs around u to pull u closer to him to hug.

* you don't actually have to watch the tv with him, he doesn't mind if you just do whatever as long as u stay his warm pillow

* if he is sleepy he will move his head to rest on your shoulder and snuggle his face into the crook of your neck. that's a sign to turn off the tv or pause the tape and move so he will actually go to bed

* he is ticklish. if u feel like u need attention u can tickle him and immediately he will react

* he is ticklish AND competitive, so u have to b prepared for revenge and a tickle battle to the death

* n e way other than that i don't really see much skinship in your relationship like he is not fond of PDA and not fond of anything more than handholding and if he can avoid it he will

* he does like to hold you by the waist. or ruffle your hair. but only in private

* fav place to kiss you? top of your head, or temple

* fav place to be kissed? if he's not expecting it he gets shy no matter where so go for it (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

* has no idea what romance is, do u actually think he knows how to resolve arguments between u two? NO

* will ask hinata for help. bless his soul, hinata is best bro hinata gives him actually good advice!! unfortunately kags cannot replicate the ways of the sunshine child and so he has to look for someone else

* will never ask tsukki. tsukishima will also not answer, anyway.

* yamaguchi, lovely sweet baby, will give him good advice and even help to pick out flowers actually it was yachi who picked over his shoulder ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) what r these two up to

* yams will become his relationship advisor

* pls give yams lots of soggy fries as reward for saving your relationship

* when you're sick he will turn to suga for help bc suga is mom bc suga is domestic god and will make some porridge or soup for him to bring to u. all hail suga the kitchen god

* suga has given kags the recipe once but after the other first years had to rescue him from the resulting fire he never touched a stove again

*******

requests are open! (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

masterlist here (♡-♡)

*******

ah yes. i've been caught up in life recently and so have not had the time to post or write but i do have a long captains crack fic i've been working on LOL. it's very long. save me. i've also been really swamped at work recently so i just can't deal with life and any free time i get i will take a nap. my therapist does not approve but yet here we are with my poor self control and lack of motivation to get better. in other news i went to see the psychiatrist today for my meds and there was a cute med student who was asking the usual questions and i just blanked half the time cos he was cute

[bigskydreaming]

“I was human once. Where were you then?” I pretty thoroughly abandoned Teen Wolf after season 4, and even before then, I didn’t engage with the fandom much, but the voice that you give Scott is enough to keep me with one toe dipped in the pond. He’s funny and clever and kind. Even years since I’ve read anything else in TW, WTWTA continues to be a favourite. Do you feel like talking about where you were planning to go with it? I’ve seen you talk about Lightning Crashes plenty, but not WTWTA.

Thank you so much for this ask! Not gonna lie, Lightning Crashes consumes most of my remaining Teen Wolf attention just because its so freaking big and I've got so much written for it over the years that like, I will riot against myself if I don't finish it because like ugh I didn't write all that just to have it sit unread in my own damn files forever, y'know? So like, while I would love to return to Where Wild Things Are someday I'm not trying to make any claims about that one until LC is off my back. Tbh, I'm trying not to make any claims about fanfic or deadlines until I'm fully recovered from my surgery and whatnot because like......my day to day life is just not reliable and I hate not being able to keep my word on stuff.

BUT. That all said, I do still have a lot of fondness for WWTA and plenty of thoughts about it and willingness to talk about where it was headed for anyone who prefers to just hear about that on the assumption it won't ever really get returned to, cuz like, you are Valid.

And I actually have a lot of fondness for that part you quoted in particular, like, I've heard a lot of good things from people about that whole interaction being a standout for them, and its a personal fave because it pretty succintly got to the heart of some of my biggest issues with Teen Wolf's portrayal of hunters and specifically their ideology and self-justifications.

Anyway, some basics about where that fic was going below the cut, and I'm happy to go into more detail or provide snippets or excerpts from future parts as well.

So the very next chapter after what was posted is actually another Scott POV, and it has Peter showing up to his house at night while his mom's at work, Cora with her uncle as well, and 'summoning' Scott to be by his side as well while Peter goes to meet with another Alpha in a rival pack's territory. (Said Alpha being Ennis, in this case).

This chapter's actually a pretty interesting one IMO because I used it to play around with a personal headcanon I have for chemo-signals. There's actually been a fair amount of theorizing in the scientific (and pseudo scientific, lol) communities about what it might be like if humans could pick up on and interpret chemo-signals, because the science suggests that actually we DO.....just at such a tiny magnification so as to make it impossible to get any like, usable data from what little our noses do pick up.

But a popular theory is that picking up on chemo-signals would produce a physiological like, 'mirroring' of what's being picked up on, like....okay, so there's this thing in a lot of evolutionary traits that are linked to survival mechanisms. Where like, the body in the act of receiving various signals from another being about something being dangerous or threatening or to be avoided, it'll essentially mimic the very signs of distress or warning in the person or creature its picking up those signals from. Its kinda part of an automatic feedback loop, like going through a version of the same reaction a person is seeing in others is part of the body and brain's interpretative process, taking in certain stimuli and then processing it in ways that end up with the brain consciously cluing in that what its seeing is that it should be wary of danger.

I'm explaining it badly, but the basic idea is like.....you know that almost instinctive flinch of horror or fear you get almost in like....sympathy, when you see someone else in obvious distress or terror....even before or without seeing or experiencing whatever it is that's making them so distressed/afraid yourself? That's an example of what I'm talking about here. One creature or person transmits various signals - be they visual by way of stance or expression, or scent, or auditory like screams - and surrounding 'pack creatures' or basically any nearby beings likely to be part of that initial being's pack or herd or community.....they pick up these signals and the message of warning or whatever being conveyed via those signals....and in the process of translating that into some kind of actionable instinct, they ALREADY replicate and thus partially pass on those very same signals themselves.

So the thing about scents that we give off even as humans, is that there's actually a LOT of data and signals encoded into these scents or the various things our bodies produce in association with these scents, like sweat. Even though we can't discern these scents to any degree that allows us to meaningfully interpret the data encoded in them, because we didn't ever end up evolving down the evolutionary path that might have resulted in us being able to smell to that degree....like, the information is still THERE, packed into those scents and odor-producing body by-products.

And that has a lot to do with why we react the way we often do to smelling someone's sweat even to the degree that we DO pick it up.....because think of what bodily reactions tend to produce sweat. Its not just physical exertions, its also in a response to nervousness or discomfort or disgust or outright danger, etc.....and our instinctive responses to scenting the sweat someone produces is often to like....mirror those very same emotions. Just to a much more minor degree than if we were able to smell to the same degree that like, we can see.....and thus pick apart single scents and interpret the various distinct elements and emotions packed INTO those, much like how our eyes are evolved to pick apart visuals and interpret specific details about shapes we see in front of us and give a lot more nuance and specificity to what our eyes are picking up on.

So the theory is that if we WERE able to smell to this keen degree....we would be able to tell a LOT about people's emotional state just from the physiological byproducts they produce in various emotional states.....BUT there'd be a trade-off. We would also be prone to the same tendency to unconsciously mimic the signals we were picking up on.....so our own scent glands, our own expressions, would be likely to 'pass on' the indications of fear or arousal or anxiety that we're smelling.

What intrigued me about this idea, in terms of werewolves who are stated to be able to pick up and interpret chemo-signals......is that it carries with it the implication that actually, most werewolves - at least those in packs - would have EXCELLENT self-control, in contrast to what most hunters believe about werewolves and their lack thereof.

Because think about it......if werewolves are constantly being bombarded with the chemo-signals of those around them, and interpreting these smells and the signals contained within them with the same matter of fact ease most of us translate the visual signals our eyes convey to us......in actuality, werewolves would need to have exceptional control over their own reactions to external stimuli.......or else they'd constantly stand out by having facial expressions and stance cues that seem to change radically with seemingly very little reason for them to do so as far as normal humans around them can tell. And at the same time, the facial reactions they might instinctively flash to in response to picking up say, stark terror from someone who was trying their best to hide that VISUALLY due to the presence of someone they were afraid of like an abuser....the fact that werewolves seemed to often be reacting to things they were picking up on in ways that seemed completely contrary to what visual or auditory cues were evident to everyone else....this would also make them stand out even in a crowd.

So to my mind, the extent to which werewolves were shown deciphering information via chemo-signals on the show suggests that actually, werewolf packs would place a huge focus on teaching their children and their new bitten members both the importance of having firm self-control over their own reactions and emotional state - in order to counter their own instinctive tendencies upon smelling things like strong fear or arousal or anxiety in others - as well as the HOW of doing just that.

Which in turn would lead to the idea that its the LACK of a pack - and the grounding knowledge and presence of other experienced werewolves - which most often results in the existence of the 'out of control' omega werewolves that hunters use to justify the necessity of their existence.

Think how bewildering it would be to constantly be bombarded with signals and cues that suggest that the people around you are at any given moment in heightened states of panic and distress and discomfort. How much that would shred your own self-control if you weren't extremely practiced - and aided - in keeping a clear awareness of your OWN emotional state and feelings at all times, so you don't get swept away by the tide of emotional information you're picking up on all sides. I imagine it wouldn't be that much different walking down the hall of a school picking up the scent chemo-signals of a hundred teenagers in the throes of puberty, hormonal changes, and constant stress and intense feelings.....than say, if you or I were to walk down that same hall and instead of just seeing and hearing a hundred teenagers laughing and talking and going about their day, we saw and heard every one of those teenagers acting out visual and auditory cues of extreme intensity on all sides, from some of them screaming for dozens of different reasons to others being clear images of someone in pain or outright terror, etc.

Its a lot. Its easy to imagine that omega werewolves would not actually be any less 'capable' than any other werewolf, they're not wild or feral because they're lesser or whatever.....its simply for whatever reason, they never were taught the lesson of just how important it is to learn how to not just interpret scent cues, but block them out when necessary or at the very least maintain a conscious awareness of how to keep your own sense of self prioritized in your brain over just....instinctively reacting to everything being flung at you information wise.

Anyway. So a big component of what's to come there is how this might impact the world of Teen Wolf if explored in depth.....

Because on the one hand, this information would be the EXACT thing needed to really put things into clarity re: hunters and werewolves. The reality that actually, most werewolves are exceptional at self-control....that when they're a danger to others, its usually because they're that way with INTENT like Deucalion or Ennis. That most werewolves aren't the inches-from-being-mindless timebombs that hunters stress are the real reason for why they exist. The omegas are actually the odd ones out, and their lack of self-control is something that can actually be mitigated by integration into existing packs or just more avenues for educating themselves on what they are now and what differences that makes in their lives and just their very approaches to life.

But on the other hand, this information is exactly what werewolves like Scott CAN'T inform hunters of en masse.....because of the existence of hunters like Gerard and Kate who actually don't CARE about the code and the idea of just existing to protect humanity from the out of control dangerous 'monsters'....but rather just want to kill werewolves for other reasons. Because hunters who were fully in the know as to how much control the average werewolf has over their emotional state....as well as WHY its so important for them to learn and practice such exceptional self-control......because of how VULNERABLE to reacting to the emotional states of others werewolves are......they would no doubt be able to weaponize this against werewolves. After all, even exceptional self control is bound to waver if say, in the presence of large numbers of humans who are being deliberately influenced to give off certain scent cues in mass quantities......just so hunters can pick out at a distance who seems to be reacting to things none of the humans present seem to be aware of, etc.

So things like this are meant to become central to Scott and Allison's burgeoning relationship and the everpresent question they each have for how much they can really trust the other - and trust the other WITH - no matter how much they want to. Even as Scott starts to fall for Allison and believe the best of her, he's very aware of her still existant ties to her family, her own 'pack' - and despite being in possession of so much knowledge about werewolves that could most likely open Allison's eyes even further to how inaccurate most of the information she and others like her father are working off of is......Scott's equally keenly aware that giving her that information COULD still backfire and put his own pack in danger if it for whatever reason doesn't end up being enough to fully bring her over to his side.

Basically the big theme of the story has always been about who can you trust, even when you really WANT to trust them, because even people with similar moralities can have conflicting priorities and its not always enough to just be on the same page in one of those respects.

Anyway, the next chapter is big on introducing the importance of chemo-signals as Peter drives to his meeting with Ennis and tells Cora and Scott to settle between themselves who will accompany him inside (a clear position of prominence relevant to the ongoing power struggle between Cora and Scott for influence among their packmates). And most of that happens by way of the two of them 'scent-talking' to each other in the backseat. Because a side-effect of the idea that smelling chemo-signals prompts certain facial cues in response, as well as exceptional control over their own emotions and thus accompanying physiological cues, means that its possible for werewolves to have very involved silent discussions just by deliberately invoking various scents for the other, etc.

Cora of course wins that mini-battle between them, by way of the leverage she has over Scott now that she knows he's able to lie to Peter without betraying it with his scent or his heartbeat. Peter would never risk having someone capable of lying to him with no sign, so that's as good of a death sentence if he finds out. But at the same time, its something Cora knows she can't milk for too long, because the longer SHE has the information that Scott is capable of that, the less effective it becomes as leverage.....since hiding that from Peter could massively backfire and put her at risk too, meaning there's only so long she can use it as leverage against Scott before it becomes a case of mutually assured destruction and he says 'go ahead, tell Peter, and once he finds out how long you've kept that from him see what position that leaves you in.'

So Cora knows this information is best used sooner rather than later, so she leverages it off the bat, to get Scott to cave on this one and so she's the one to accompany Peter to his top secret meeting with Ennis and learn whatever they're talking about and what the basis of this alliance they seem to have formed is. Also, Peter comes out of the meeting carrying a mysterious box he got from Ennis, that seems to have been his goal all along, and has Cora troubled, but unwilling to divulge any information about what it might be.

Scott however gets something out of the meeting too, because even while left outside, he discovers some key information.....Ennis' pack includes Jiang and Tierney, two members of Brett's old pack that he thought were dead. Ennis had 'taken them in' though they really didn't have a ton of choice in the matter and were less than thrilled about it....which gives Scott the start of an actual plan. Which thickens once he learns Brett's sister Lorilee is alive as well, and a member of Kali's pack, along with refugees from another wiped out pack, the Primals.

Essentially, where this is all building towards is over time, Scott starts reaching out to the exploited and miserable teens stuck at the bottom of abusive packs they never asked to be a part of but are afraid to leave....and begins building an alliance of teens across multiple local packs. None of them are strong enough to overthrow their own Alphas on their own, but together, they could be strong enough to overthrow a single Alpha, and then consolidate as a pack of their own behind a single teen Alpha.

Of course, problem is Cora figures this out eventually as well, and begins building her own rival alliance among teens from Kali's pack and others, and it essentially becomes a race to get an alliance strong enough to topple Peter built first, before the other can make their move.

On Allison's side of things, she begins mentoring the younger teens that Scott picked out as being eyed by his Alpha as potential recruits. This involves teaching them archery at her house one weekend, only to then discover from Gerard's conversation with her parents that hunters recovered the arrow Allison had shot through Isaac's shoulder way back in the first chapter. They found blood on it, and are planning to use it to see if the person that blood belongs to is in the system at all. Which Isaac is, due to being in the foster care system, even if only nominally.

Feeling complicit and not ready to trust the werewolves yet but not willing to feel personally responsible for the death of someone she goes to school with, Allison alerts Scott to the danger. Which in turn leads to the pack under Peter's orders, like, breaking into the facility where the arrow and blood are being analyzed and destroy the sample before it can trace back to Isaac and from there, the rest of them by association.

Problem is, its Matt's first official 'outing' on a werewolf mission and he decides to revel in his newfound power by killing a guard. Welcome to Team Blue Eyes, Mattie. That didn't take long. Not that anyone is surprised, but Scott is a bit screwed by it. Because now Allison is furious and retreating from their slowly building alliance/relationship because she feels guilty that her information led to someone getting killed by a werewolf and thinks she never should have shared her intel even though Scott tries to stress that he had no control over Matt and could do nothing to stop it.

So that kinda puts a roadblock in the Scallison that takes time to work past, though it will of course get worked past.

Meanwhile elsewhere, Peter's plans for turning more freshmen are delayed when Cora and Scott both feel pressed to alert him of a surprising development at Beacon Hills High before the other tells Peter first. Suddenly there are two new werewolves at school - albeit very nervous, scared and confused werewolves - and they aren't transfer students. Someone turned two of their classmates, Tracy and Josh, and that someone was NOT Peter. So now Peter is outraged because someone is turning people in his territory which is a clear challenge from another Alpha, and he wants to know who. Which leads to Erica and Boyd being assigned to tail the new wolves and see who they lead back to.....as well as both Scott and Cora, by now accelerating their efforts to build up support for their positions both inside and outside of the pack, like both of them now make plays to get Erica and Boyd from the No Man's Land they've been residing in, and get them to finally pick a side between the two rivals for Peter's Alpha crown. With the information they glean from following the two new surprise werewolves being vital to both Scott and Cora's plans.

The Alpha in question turns out to be Deucalion, who is back in the area after years away where he seemed uninterested in werewolf politics, but now seems to be intent on building up a new pack for himself across multiple Alphas' territories in earnest.

Meanwhile meanwhile, Scott has started to worry about where Theo's loyalties actually lie, as Boyd informs him that part of what's kept him from throwing in with Scott is Boyd keeps his nose to the ground to stay very informed on what's what and keep abreast of what everyone else is doing at all times - Boyd is very big on the idea that knowledge and thus information is power - so Boyd has been paying more attention to Theo than even Scott has lately, given how much Scott's got going on at the moment. And Theo's been making some moves of his own that have Boyd distrustful of just how much Scott ACTUALLY has his loyalty, and thus Boyd is wary of hitching his wagon to the prospective Alpha who is perhaps not as well or thoroughly supported as he thinks he is, or is counting on being.

So Theo being Theo will complicate matters considerably. Note that I don't go with unnecessarily evil Theo ever, as that's boring, but I always fuck with absolutely and necessarily self-interested and amoral Theo because that's anti-boring. So Theo's not out to screw Scott just to screw him (well not THAT way at least), but Theo is big on covering his bases and he's contemplating making his own bid for power because he's not sure he trusts that Scott can pull this off and Cora's not an option given that he HAS until now been Team Scott in all visible ways, so he's seeking....other options. Just so he can have the most possible options and vet them thoroughly before deciding on a course of action, naturally.

The big tipping point to all of this will come when someone betrays Scott to some hunters and leads to him being captured and identified as a werewolf by some hunters loosely affiliated with Allison's family.....and Allison makes her choice here for good and risks everything to rescue Scott which might involve someone dying. Not a main character. But uh, there definitely is some dying and it makes Allison and Scott both feel things like guilt, regret, self-recrimination and also "I did what I did and that's that about that" with only like 60% of that being bravado to cover up omg I have no idea what I'm even doing anymore.

In order to find somewhere for Scott to recuperate that is not her house, because lol duh, and is not Scott's house, because Peter lol duh, a desperate Allison ends up looping in Lydia, Danny, Jackson and Stiles, and enlisting their help in hiding Scott at Lydia's lakehouse until he recovers. This leads to them all finally being in the know and uncomfortably allying with Isaac and some other werewolf members of Team Scott, who are of course furious at the betrayal of any werewolf giving up one of their own to hunters, let alone Scott.....which leads to the twins making a surprise shift in allegiance, because they think Cora was behind the hunters finding out and that's too far for them. It was NOT in fact Cora, but it might have been someone ON Team Cora who thought they were doing what Cora would have wanted them to do. And by might have I mean definitely and also they were Not Correct in their assumptions about what Cora would want. She and Scott are rivals and she's an antagonist here but she's not evil or even as bloodthirsty as she pretends to be for appearances, but she like Theo is looking out for number one and what she believes is best for what remains of a Hale pack, any Hale pack.

Other stuff happens, Liam does get turned, Mason gets his druidic knowledge on because that's a Trope that no Kalen story will ever be without, and the ultimate showdown between teens and asshole adult werewolves will end with Scott True Alpha level-upping but Peter definitely will still die as will several other Alphas and Scott is not the only teen who ends up an Alpha at the end of things though each teen Alpha will for now go their own way with their own pack made up of kids from the two teen wolf alliances. There will be confrontations with the hunters before the end too, beyond just rescuing Scott from the NPC hunters who are destined for Demiseville, population them, but the hunters will not be 'totally defeated' in as much as that's even a possibility, and the story was always meant to end with the McCall pack and some human allies taking to the road to find somewhere else to establish a territory and build their strength (and graduate high school) before making a full stand against hunters.

Backstory is meant to be filled in all the way through, with a focus on Scott and Derek's not-at-all-like-canon relationship as for the first year or so after Scott was turned, Derek was still around and did his best to help guide and teach Scott while acting as a buffer against his uncle which Scott greatly appreciated and his thoughts of 'fuck you Derek' should be taken as unreliable narration and mostly just cynical humor cuz he misses him. With said backstory reveals culminating in the eventual shocker of how Derek died (surprise, it was Peter in the parlor with the backstabbing and also candlestick), Cora finding out, cue Cora Not Being Very Pleased With Uncle Peter At The Moment, Actually, and like....other shenanigans are had.

Also also there may be a road trip involved at the veeeeeery end, that involves the mysterious box Peter traded something to Ennis for, which may or may not be magic and resurrection-oriented, but also definitely is both those things and aimed at a grand finale of teen Derek rising from mystical waters being like "who the fuck are you" at Scott who smiles and says "we're brothers."

And that's what you missed on Glee.

[fellhellion]

what do you think of rodrigue as a character? i feel like a lot of people think of him as an unsympathetic parent, and it's not untrue, considering how he treats felix. but from his conversations with gilbert it felt like he was also trying to cope with his grief, but it was in a way that's very much influenced by the toxicity of faerghus's culture. *vaguely gestures at felix and rodrigue* these two can fit so much emotional constipation

i think he’s a really interesting character tbh, and specifcally for the fact that, like u said, he’s a product of his culture with allthe trappings that entails and unconsciously replicates that in son. i understand people viewing him as an unsympathetic parent sure, but for me i sympathise w the guy. 

You have the component of devotion to one’s monarch, the holy kingdom instilling a reverance for warriors of legend and those particular skills in of themselves within their children (you learn to fight before u can talk) and then ON TOP OF THAT the near reverance with one treats their allegiance to their lord, how that devotion is admired even when the cause is condemned. 

Think of how Gilbert and Rodrigue praise Gwendal for his devotion to his lord even when the man literally helped subjugate their own country fkdjfhsdh the devotion to a liege to the point of death is seen in of itself as extremely noble and admirable even just on a cultural level

Rodrigue took the last mission he was given by a king he obviously and dearly loved and essentially made that a foundation for his life going forward when not only Glenn died but Lambert as well, even to the detriment of his remaining child. I think it’s a choice that’s understandable given how he views his own role as the king shield but i also get why it angers felix yknow? 

that desire to ascribe value to death that is, in reality, senseless, is both reflective of the Kingdom’s cultural view of war and battle but on a personal level, also an understandably way for a parent to cope with the loss of their son. Rodrigue found meaning in a life of service, so of course he ascribes the same thing to the death of his son, more so even because otherwise you’d have to look it in the face for the senseless tragedy it was. 

And on top of that, I sympathise w his relationship w Felix yknow. He clearly speaks of their fight all those year ago with regret but any interaction he has w his son is avoided at best (WC) or very frosty (AM). I think he doesn’t know how to handle to his own grief, let alone his son lashing out over the same thing and condemning everything not only he stands for, but that their culture venerates. And i GET that yknow? Felix has so much complicated bullshit going on that not even HE is processing on a conscious level, and heck, rodrigue even has the same coping mechnanisms of just fkldjflksd flat out avoiding those complicated issues and conversations. 

fhjkdhfjkd theyre both such a mess and i like them even if i want to kick their asses for different issues

[margridarnauds]

margrid arnaud das music-i mean marie antoinette das musical for that ask meme

LET’S GO

 Top 5 favourite characters: Margrid, Orléans, Louis, Marie, Fersen

Other characters you like: Lamballe, the kids, Robespierre, Danton, Immortal Marat

Least favourite characters: Hébert, Bertin, Hébert, Leonard, Jacques Réne Hébert, Drouet, Hébert...

Otps: Margrid/Orléans, Marie/Louis....I COULD ship Margrid/Lamballe and Margrid/La Motte but let’s be real I’m not going to, Marie/Orléans in a very specific way (namely Bitter Ex Friends)

Notps: Hébert/Margrid, Fersen/Margrid, Hébert/Orléans

Favourite friendships: Fersen & Margrid, Lamballe & Antoinette, Orléans & Lamballe (not canon to the musical, but was a historical Thing), Orléans & Margrid when I’m not actively shipping them. 

Favourite family: Marie’s family, especially her dynamic with Margrid (LET ! MARGRID ! BE ! THE WEIRD! AUNT!) and Louis’ odd dynamic with Orléans. Really, MA is just the story of one very, very dysfunctional family. 

Favourite season/book/movie: 2018 Toho Production. 

Favourite quotes: .....showing myself for the Orléans Stan I am: “Oh, cowards, tremble and sleep!” Mitsuo Yoshihara’s delivery SELLS it. Honorable mention: “Just the smallest of sparks is sufficient to set dry grass into an inferno - I just need to promise them a new world where they can live in.” 

That and the from the final song, the entire cast: “Can we change the world for ourselves? What can we do to break the chains of violence? What is equality? When will people finally learn from the past? Will revenge ever end? That answer can only be yielded by ourselves!” 

Best musical moment: There are some REALLY good moments in this musical - Margrid calling the wrath of God down on the aristocrats during “Blinded by the Light of a Thousand Candles”, the reprise of “Blinded” when the poor join in with Margrid, the entirety of “I Am The Best”, the key change in the Korean version of “Kill the Snakes”, the part during the March to Versailles when the other women join in for the first time to tell Margrid they aren’t going, Fersen’s low note during his first love song with Antoinette, the bit during “The Only Thing I ever Did Right” when Fersen comes in for the first time and he and Antoinette duet,  the bit during The Jacobin Club when the entire Jacobin Club steps out together and swears to bring down Antoinette, the bit during “Eyes of Hatred” when Margrid and Antoinette’s voices blend PERFECTLY, the bit during the trial when the crowd begins to apply pressure to Antoinette while Margrid realizes how fucked up things have gotten. 

Moment that made you fangirl/boy the hardest: I was trying to not be predictable.....but look. I lose my shit every time we get to “I Am The Best”. Because they really DID give Orléans the single best song in the musical and expected us NOT to stan. That and when he takes his final bow, because he gets a reprise of the song WITH electric guitars because, yes, he’s an extra bitch. 

When it really disappointed you: The 2021 Toho. I could devote an entire post to how that production disappointed me, even outside of my personal ships, but like. It was a disappointment from beginning to end and I’m actually happy that it’s out of Tokyo now. 

Saddest moment: Margrid sobbing after Antoinette’s death and then having to wipe the tears off her face to meet the tribunal. And then the look on her face at the end....

Most well done character death: Marie’s - Literally the entire musical has been leading up to this and the scene itself makes a wonderful use of callbacks and musical cues to give it this sense of TENSION throughout the entire thing, which builds off of that earlier scene where Hébert confronts Margrid. We know that Antoinette is going to die - There’s no way of avoiding it, but we still are wondering what’s going to happen. What’s Margrid going to do? Is she going to risk a life of security for the sake of the woman she’s started to feel sympathy for? Are these two women ever going to come to terms with one another, with the answer being yes as Antoinette by calls Margrid by her name instead of “the girl” and Margrid gives that last, dangerous bow. 

Favourite cast member: I’m not generally big on following individual cast members, but PROBABLY Sonim? 

Character you wish was still alive: I. Might have toyed with a few ways of keeping Marie alive in the past. 

One thing you hope really happens: Really, really hoping the upcoming Korean production is good. Like, that’s the extent of my ambition after the last Toho. 

Most shocking twist: Lamballe’s Death. I have NEVER seen anyone come in prepared for it in over 2 years of streaming. *I* was shocked when I saw it because I literally never expected a Japanese depiction of Marie Antoinette to get into the September Massacres, especially do THAT extent. And it really is the point where, suddenly, you realize that NO ONE is safe. Up until this point, no one’s died. The Royal Family’s imprisoned, but there’s a certain romanticism you can find in the situation, the idea that, hey, now they’re a happy, nuclear family. Then, the show distracts you with that discussion between Marie and Margrid so that they it can SLAM the knife into your back. And, from that point, no one’s safe. Literally anyone in the cast can die, to the point where people do, genuinely fear for Margrid’s safety by the end. It’s probably one of the single best twists I’ve seen in musical theatre, because it sets the stage for the last twenty minutes brilliantly. 

When did you start watching/reading?: You know? It had to have been back in 2013. A subber that I liked had JUST finished Rebecca das Musical and had moved on to Marie Antoinette, and I thought “Well! Kunze and Levay came out with a Mar’ie Antoinette musical? I’ve got to see this, it’s going to be good!” 

Spoiler alert: It was not good. I made it twenty minutes in, got to the brothel scene, and never looked back. Which means that, actually, I only BARELY missed Orléans’ song. 

Favourite location: Antoinette’s bedroom - Those crazy sons of bitches REALLY replicated Antoinette’s ACTUAL BED to use. 

Trope you wish they would stop using: Stop trying to make Fersen/Margrid happen, it’s not going to happen. In general, there’s this idea that Margrid MUST be totally, absolutely loveless, and I don’t really see it. I’ll be the last to say she hasn’t had a hard life, but there’s this need to ISOLATE her that I just don’t really vibe with. I’m not even saying in an inherently romantic sense (in canon...I wouldn’t actually WANT to see, say, her and Orléans making out on-stage), but just in terms of having genuine connections. 

One thing this show/book/film does better than others: It really does a wonderful job as far as developing two separate female characters - Which shouldn’t be THAT HARD, given you have plenty of musicals about multiple guys all the time, and yet SOMEHOW....

Also, Margrid in particular is phenomenal, as a character. It’s definitely not uncommon for people to go in for Marie and end up really, really attached to Margrid and her development. 

Funniest moments: Hébert nearly getting hit with a door, Margrid peaking under her ball gown while it’s on the rack and Orléans dragging her away, the Stars and Stripes Gown....

Couple you would like to see: .....Orléans/Margrid. I know that I say I don’t want them to actually be CANON canon but also I would NOT complain if they did. Especially after the 2021 Toho production, it’s what I deserve. 

Actor/Actress you want to join the cast: Park Hye Na as Korean!Margrid would kill me, I know it. 

Favourite outfit: Besides Orléans’ 2018 coat (4ever in our hearts), special props to Antoinette’s golden gown in the opening. WHAT a character introduction. 

Favourite item: Margrid’s little knapsack she keeps on her. 

Do you own anything related to this show/book/film?: I own a ballpoint pen and a program from the 2021 Toho run - One of these days, I keep meaning to buy the German libretto so that I can translate it. 

Most boring plotline: BERTIN AND LEONARD. (But, in all fairness........look, they’re annoying, but also, when they’re gone, you do miss them, because that’s when shit gets fucked.) 

Most laughably bad moment: The entire 2006 Toho Cast exists just to be one very long laughably bad moment. That and, tbh, the German. Special props to the Brothel Scene. 

Most layered character: Margrid. Marie is ALSO a very layered, complex character, but Margrid gets special props because, off the top of my head, I can’t REALLY think of another female protagonist, in a musical, like her. Not saying they don’t EXIST, but I’m saying I haven’t personally seen them. 

Most one dimensional character: ...2006 Orléans. He Who We Don’t Discuss. 

Scariest moment: See above for Lamballe. 

Grossest moment: Hébert's final confrontation scene with Margrid. 

Best looking male: Kim Jun Hyun’s Orléans. *Wow*. 

Best looking female: Jang Eun Ah’s Margrid. Once again. *Wow.* 

Who you’re crushing on (if any): ...both Orléans and Margrid. Predictably. 

Favourite cast moment: Furukawa Yuta pranking Mitsuo Yoshihara by giving him “poisonous” things for his birthday, because “You are Duke d’Orleans and I am Fersen. You are poisonous and I am passive aggressive.”

Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise): The ball at Versailles. One of the most STUNNING scenes I’ve ever seen. Whoever did the lighting deserves all the accolades in the world for creating a scene that’s surreal, seductive, and gorgeous 

Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you: Not an ERROR, but I’m really, really interested in the story of Jeanette Arnaud, because this woman really haunts Margrid’s entire life but there’s so LITTLE we know about her and Margrid’s feelings about her. How long did her affair with the Emperor last? Did she always know he was the emperor during their affair, or did they meet under different circumstances? Fersen was clearly able to figure out that she was a mistress of his, so how public was the affair? And, if it was that public, does it mean that she was a servant, or was she, at the very least, middle class? How did he find out her mother’s identity? Why didn’t Orléans double-check himself? Does Margrid have any living grandparents or uncles/aunts? How old was Margrid when she died? Did she die before or after Margrid was kicked out by the nuns? (In the German, it’s very clearly the former, but who knows?)

I feel like there’s a really, really dark, tragic tale underneath all this about a young woman who ended up paying the ultimate price for falling in love with someone above her station, but it’s one that’s kept to literally only a few sentences. 

At what point did you fall in love with this show/book: Probably about.....five or ten minutes into the Toho, with the Palais Royal scene. I knew, from the time I saw Furukawa Yuta on stage as Fersen, that they’d changed things around, and then seeing the changes that were made, I was able to go “Oh! It’s good now!” I feel like the moment where I REALLY fell in love was “I Am The Best” because that had been a scene I’d been REALLY concerned about from the German and then Mitsuo Yoshihara casually came in there and owned it. 

[fyeahbatcat]

What are your thoughts on Gotham's finale, and the show's overall handling of Selina Kyle, and the BatCat relationship? Any missed opportunities, or things you would've done differently?

tbh I the finale was not what I was expecting, which I guess is insome ways a good thing. I kept thinking, “the show’s almost over. Where’sBatman.” Then I remembered something they said early in the series; thatthere’s a price you have to pay DC Comics to use Bruce Wayne’s image and a separate price you payto use Batman, and it crossed my mind, more than once, that maybe Fox couldn’tafford Batman and we were only going to see him from the back of the head. Rihanna.this_is_the_most_ghetto_shit_i’ve_ever_seen_in_my_life.png.But they ended up delivering on that at the end for a whole 8.5 seconds.

I was expecting Bruce and Selina to have a reunion at the end, butI was expecting something a little more dramatique. I have to keep in mind thatwhile this is the end of Gotham, it’s really only the beginning of the story sothe way Bruce and Selina “ended” things makes sense. I liked how Selinaconfronting Bruce was raw and emotional. Ten years between them, but nothinghad changed. They still knew each other well, like when Selina knew right awaythat Bruce was watching her, and obviously their feelings hadn’t changed. Eventhough we didn’t get to see it, this love story is just getting started.

Overall, I think that Bruce and Selina’s relationship was uniqueto the world of Gotham and in many ways this worked. The biggest problem that Ihad with how the relationship was portrayed on the show was the inconsistency. Iget that they were probably going to a frenemies/will-they-won’t-they kind ofthing but even by tv standards it got a little ridiculous. It was to the point whereBruce and Selina went from *dating* to not speaking to each other like everytwo episodes; especially after the mid-way point of season three. They spent allthat time building up the relationship which led to the big rooftop moment andit appeared that they were finally going to get together and it was great butthen they broke them up before we even really got a chance to enjoy it. Theworst part of it was they came up with the dumbest reason for breaking them up.Selina’s mom was a grifter who was using her, and this was somehow Bruce’sfault, and then he was mad at her because…she was mad at him??? Make it makesense.

Then they spent almost all of season four barely speaking to eachother just to be thrown together in the last few episodes because they neededto be on good enough terms to justify using Selina as a stand in for BarbaraGordon for their replication of the most misogynistic Batman comic ever published.I think that the writers became too enamored with the romantic tropes and makingBruce and Selina have the type of relationship they think they should have, rather than one that worked for show. Thisis why I think relationship was better in the earlier seasons. When it comes toGotham batcat: when it’s good, it’s very good.  When it’s bad…yeesh.

I have a loooooooooot of issues with the some of the directionthat they took Selina over the course of the show. Gotham had a reputation fortreating their female characters like garbage, there’s not a whole lot that I cansay to defend them on that. For one thing they had Selina getting abused by menway too often. First, they had Alfred bitch slap her in the second season whenshe was…what fourteen at the time. I like Gotham,generally, but I’m not okay with Alfred straight up slapping little girls. Thenshe was very nearly murdered by Bruce’s clone because she rejected his romanticadvances. Then came TKJ thing, and Selina gets shot just to give Bruce man-pain.

But honestly out of all of that stuff imo the worstthing they did to Selina was in the premiere of season five. They involvedSelina in an incredibly harmful trope that quadriplegic people are better off deadand resolved it with a magic fix one episode later without making even a vagueattempt at showing disability as something that you can live with. This is especiallyegregious because Selina was used as a substitute of Barbara Gordon in thestoryline, and post TKJ (thanks to efforts of Kim Yale and John Ostrander) Barbarawasn’t forgotten and neither was her disability. She was still written as apowerful hero in her own right, and one of the most prominent superheroes witha disability. It’s 2019. How they handled it with Selina was not only badwriting; it was irresponsible.

I feel like with Selina they didn’t do quiet enough todevelop her character independently and they didn’t go deep enough into her characterbeyond tropes and pop culture references. The best solo arc that they had forher was her friendship with Bridgit Pike. It was like they were always on thecusp of doing something great with Selina but never really followed through. Forexample, in season 3 they did the homage to BatmanReturns but that experience didn’t significantly change her. In BMR Selinagetting pushed out of the window represented a rebirth. The meek helpless secretarythat she was died, and she was reborn as a woman who refused to let herself bepushed around. On Gotham Selina was pushed from the window and she…started usinga whip…five episodes later.

They also teased that Selina was going to get cat-likepowers in season five, and then she didn’t. I’ll take this moment to go onrecord and say that I’m never a fan of giving Selina superpowers. It’s corny.My point is: Gotham would always make promises that they didn’t deliver on and sometimesit was very frustrating.

The biggest missed opportunity to develop Selina’s characterwas how they got rid of her mother after three episodes. This arc made no sensewhatsoever. Selina being abandoned at a young age was obviously traumatic for herand shaped a lot of who she was. At the beginning of the series she avoidedgetting attached people and firmly believed that one can and should only look outfor themselves. But by her reaction to reuniting with Maria, a part of her obviouslystill desired that relationship. They addressed her hurt and betrayal in a way,but they were really just using it as an excuse to break up Bruce and Selina.They made it about their relationship rather than her and her mother’srelationship. The Batman mythos are so contingent on father/son relationshipsand this was a chance to show a complex mother/daughter relationship for once. Ijust think it was such a wasted opportunity.

Perhaps Maria could’ve shown Selina the con artist lifestyleand that’s how she developed her skills for her future career as a world classthief. The opportunity was right there staring them in the face and they wasted it.

I know this post seems very critical, but I’ve talked a lotover the years about the things that I liked about Gotham and all of the thingsthat I didn’t like have just been festering. You’ll see more as I continue my Gotham top 20 challenge.

[bma-2020]

POST-SERIES THINGS, HOW MALLY GOT TO THE OYSTER WORLD.

(Notice for spoilers to Sy/fy Alic/e if you haven’t watched it and care abt spoilers or smthn)

     WHICHEVER method of Mally during the miniseries we go with (Method one: She joins Hatter and Alice on their endeavors when Hatter goes to find her in the forest. Method two: She’s been trapped in the Casino for awhile, after Jack Heart finds out where she is, goes to interrogate Hatter, and she turns herself in to ensure he doesn’t get in trouble for it.) This is how it ends up.

As Bean pointed out in this one post from probably 2014 or so since I was already following bean by that point, that I will forever be linking to even tho Bean doesn’t write Hatter anymore n tries to hide the fact that Bean can do math better than basically everyone or at least me, before Hatter goes through the looking glass to find Alice, it’s at least three months in Wonderland time. That’s why he’s all healed up, has nicer hair, changed his hat, god better clothes, all that. 

Whatever happened, I do have it where Mally was with him during that time. Whether it’s the healing period from being trapped for so long, or just her trying to fix him up because he’s a wreck and in denial of being a wreck, either way, she’s not the kind to ditch her friend. Especially when the new king is the same dude who she was forcibly engaged to before she ran away, gaslit her, tried to convince her to ‘work with him’ and he could ‘convince his mother to let her go’ before she was sent down to the asylum, she’s not happy about the current royalty. That, on top of how he’s treated hatter in the past (I know the series doesn’t go into it but I highly highly highly doubt Hatter was that antagonistic towards Jack just out of jealousy and because he was the Queen’s son, it seemed a bit more personal than that. ) she ain’t about that.

But, she notices just about everything about Hatter. Now, of course, as much as I don’t say anything bc I don’t want ppl to be all ‘oh you’re trying to force ship’ when a: i’m not. b: unrequited shit. c: this was canon for her when I wrote w other hatters throughout 2013 or so through 2015, I didn’t say anything, I avoided saying anything, but Mally definitely has always had some kind of love for him. It’s in her nature, she is in love with Hatter, and she won’t say anything, so I don’t either. We all know how I am, I don’t even tell people when I do ship the muses and would wanna write it out cause yknow, I have massive anxiety about that and scaring people away so if I let them come to me abt it instead its not my idea first and I can’t be ‘awful or terrible’ for being a person yknow how it is. 

Anyways, she definitely would have noticed that he was missing Alice. And, while from how we know my writing goes, she has those reflections of the original wonderland, she has vague memories of the original alice ( which, in the version where she was taken by Jack and put back in the asylum, those memories expand a lot. Thus meaning, she remembers a whole lot more about the original wonderland because she can’t avoid it in that situation.) she liked Alice H, but she didn’t view her as the ‘legend’, she didn’t see her as an ideal, she honestly would have preferred if he wanted to go find the OG Alice, but long and behold.

She’d convince him to do what was best for him.

Even in the situation where he’d be trying to help her out of that trauma, she’d still tell him not to worry about her, because she only wants what would make. him. happy. 

And yeah, that fucks her up when he actually goes.

I don’t think she said that with the belief he’d actually go, so him actually going definitely wasn’t expected. She wouldn’t have wanted him to go, she wanted him happy, but I think inside she actually thought he’d just choose her over someone he knew for three days. That’s her headspace, don’t twist my thought process on this bc I actually ship this specific version of h/attice but mally would still be like ‘you knew her for three frickan days dude’

so she’s extremely not okay during the first few weeks after he left. Jack tried to contact her during that time, he’s still trying to get her to work with/for him, she’s not about that. Even in a completely damaged state of mind, she ain’t gonna go with Jack Heart for anything.

But, during that damaged period, is when the Cheshire Cat comes back. She’s talked to him before, he’s the only one with complete memories of the prior world and the current world, he doesn’t actually tell anyone anything. He talks to her about the Wonders. She does wander off to try and find the Vorpal Blade, and she does. In the process, she comes across Necros.

Necros spoke to her for a few moments, and ultimately when she said she didn’t want to be around him, he left her alone. One of the first people since Hatter to show her any ounce of respect like that, tbh. She does have a moment of time where she ends up in the Court of Swords, learns her mom is a Queen, all that jazz, realizes her own mother wants to use her for something, nothing pretty comes of that. 

But, within a few weeks, she ends up having a breakdown in the forest, she’s alone, she’s abandoned, nobody wants to help her, everyone she meets wants to use her, the one person she thought wouldn’t hurt her left her for a girl he knew for three days. and then Necros finds her, alone in the forest of Wabe, he doesn’t say anything to her, but he does offer her a hand, and she ends up going with him. That’s how she ends up coming to the underground.

Necros, Celeste, the underground just treats her nicely. She’s not used to it, she sees that nice treatment as a huge ‘what the fuck’ tbh, she’s just like ‘idk what’s happening rn but they arent hurting me so’ Necros has Monstrous Crow train Mally further, as Monstrous Crow can replicate others powers and helps them to fully achieve their ‘perfect’ status. From what she understood, they weren’t helping her to ‘use’ them, they were trying to help her not have to isolate herself anymore. With Monstrous Crow’s powers, they were able to develop a stronger version of her brother’s injectables that allowed others to touch her (as, March and Hatter were the only two that weren’t affected by her extremely cold temperature). 

This was a lot stronger than the one her brother developed. They made one that she could take instead. Granted, if she takes it, it weakens her excessively for days at a time, so Necros doesn’t recommend she take it over convincing whoever else to do it, cause they only need one injection and they’re done, never have to worry about it again. She’d have to do it every few days and it hurts her, they tried finding a way outside of that, because she could get to the point of her own power where she can stop it, but she’s not there yet. She might never get there. 

And, she chose to stay with them because the idea of completely getting rid of the Hearts family and bringing the true royalty back to Wonderland (the High Arcana, since the White and Red families weren’t around anymore, either finding a surviving relative fit to rule or convincing the court of fools to stop keeping away from it) and Mally actually made it go beyond that. She wanted Alice to come back and rule because nobody would be more fit to rule than her and Necros agreed, thus it seemed fitting to put her in charge of their operations in the Oyster land. 

Now, a lot of the underground are magical and they’re scientists. They learned methods to transfer back and forth from the oyster world without the time shenanigans that happen with others. This basically means that they can use the looking glasses they made to traverse back and forth and the time they spend in oyster land, when they go back to wonderland the same amount of time still passed. They went beyond the study of realm travel to ensure they didn’t lose anything. 

Monstrous Crow went with her, and the original idea was ‘saving’ oysters that... were better than average humans, and who were suffering in their realm and needed to be accepted, needed people to help them feel better about themselves, honestly because who better to convince to be on your side than someone longing for positive attention. Mally still helps with that, but she’s also going beyond that, and she’s trying to find out where Alice Liddell went. What happened to her. 

She knows that after 150 years of their time, it could have been more for the oysters, and she knows oysters dont live that long. But she also knows Alice wasn’t all human, that there was something supernatural about her that gave her the ability to control aspects of Wonderland. Therefore, she believes that she can’t be entirely gone. Part of her had to be reborn into someone or something else and that’s who Mally’s trying to find, particularly hoping that she’ll be like Mally is and have recollections of the past. That’s her main goal. 

But, there’s another goal she has too. She is actually trying to find Hatter. I think it’s more for closure on her end, to learn if he’s happy, see if his ‘ditching her’ made life better for him. That would lead to a lot more emotional spikes on her end cause, lbr, she’s gonna think abt the fact that he was only happy after leaving her behind, she acts extremely self confident but internally she’s a mess. 

[emmastudies]

How would you recommend dealing w timed assessments? I feel I write quite slowly and a lot of the time I never manage to write all that I want to, so unless I have an answer prepared and memorized, my grade suffers :/

Hey! Here are a couple of things:

practice (seems obvious but I’ll mention it!) -  I think the thing really is practising as a study method - perhaps you can try to use memorised paragraphs to write out within 20-40 minute time periods, replicating your test conditions. The more time you can spend practicing those assessment like conditions the better you’ll be when you’re in those situations for real.

throughout the semester, create your own questions - it is also very much about thinking on the spot and bringing up ideas that can relate. I’m not sure if you are doing what I did in high school (the NSW HSC) but in each subject, they had a selection of key questions or themes that made the basis of most exams - both from school and as final board exams. In my legal studies class, my teacher made us print off these 4-5 questions on to blank pages and each time we covered a topic, we would go through and add that point (and a few examples) under which question it could fit. This was so incredibly helpful for revision, practice essays, being able to pull content to fit the question, etc. You can try to make up your own questions or find some asked in class or on previous tests, and do this yourself :-)

annotate the question - whenever you get a question in the exam, pick it apart. See what is it asking you to do with the information you’re writing and then write briefly the content you could potentially cover. This is a great way to plot out your assignment without spending too much time focused on structure. When you’re writing, you’ll be able to look back at those few key areas and add them in - avoiding that 10 minutes of blank staring until you get an idea.

prepare answers slightly - tbh it is kinda shit that a lot of our grades, ‘intelligence’, etc is pretty much based on how much we can remember, rather than what we’ve actually learnt and are able to apply. A lot of my exam results have come from pure memorisation of the words, not really the content. But, this is the system so ya know. In my study notes, I’d add in small practice paragraphs for key bits I thought would be likely in an exam. It was so so helpful when questions I’d already got paragraphs on would come up!

sample answers - again, I’m not sure which system you’re in so I don’t know if you can access past answers, but they’re incredibly useful if you can. Once I started reading them and see how these students were getting the top marks, it made my writing much much better. I could see how they were making the most of their time and what they were focusing on. It gave me an outline of what my essays should look like - especially ones that are thought of on the spot.

I hope this helps! Best of luck with it all xxx

[tedfashionski]

Reality Patch

 (3393 - long read, messy, technically ‘unfinished’ whatever that means)

There was a little bubble of interest in the Miu Miu pre-fall collection in the twitterverse a few weeks (months? years?) back – it seemed torn out of time. Made in the winter, shown to press in January? Viral in the early summer? To be bought..… sometime? Part of the issue is the term ‘pre-fall’. Pretty certain that’s summer. This collection feels like it doesn’t exist. I guess if I ever went shopping, it would make more sense? But as a broke hut-dwelling internet denizen, I’m lost. It’s this money-spinning side to fashion commerce that’s the ‘real’ collection, but it’s named after a non-existent season. The pre-fall/resort problem lies in that it’s the collection that gets the least press, because not normally presented in a show, but also functions more solidly as merchandise. Certain agitators want to eliminate these non-events, and revert to twice-yearly seasons. It’s a fucking mess. What even is this?  The fashion calender is broken and illogical. I’m going to write here about the Marni AW 20 ‘Alice in Wonderland’ collection alongside Moocher’s pre-fall thing, because I’ve got queries about patchwork and they play well together.

 I have …complicated… feelings about the patchwork. We’re probably going to see more and more of it and I’m not sure we’re asking the right questions of it. How do we avoid it becoming just ‘aesthetic’ (in pop speak = empty), rather than a manner of process that informs continual work going forward and results in an un-replicable feeling, a new angle on reality (an….. aesthetic). How to stop it becoming something we all get bored of? Because, the only guarantee in fashion is boredom.

 Patchwork collage

 Miu was a solid offering – it maintains a certain quality, obvs – and is good in its own way according to its own logic as Miuccia’s offerings usually are. A vision of commerce, yes, but also a kaleidoscopic frozen moment of girlhood that wants to aid us in our navigation from then to there, the ‘there’ being an upcoming un-season (A/W/S/S?) and maybe a sense of maturity. Now, there’s no point in me complaining about low quality info from the establishment on their dealings then failing to engage thoroughly with work when it is delivered in detail on multiple fronts (written aspect, full campaign, video that I can’t find anymore but remember seeing unless it was a hallucination, and look book – many angles).

 Embellished bodices/check check/white fuzzy tights/nice shiny heels/19th c take on afghan jacket very good/prairie psycho/much boring merch – (awkward stances suggest candid, ambivalent)

   Miu look book Collage

Our press release ponders:

 ‘When was the last occasion you lived in an enclosed world, where time stretched out, seemingly endlessly, in front of you? When was the last time your interior world felt as important as the exterior one, where you were free to imagine and to contemplate who you might actually want to be? Chances are it was when you were a teenager, with all of the triumphs and trepidations that entailed, particularly if you were a teenage girl.’

 Well, it sure sounds like it sucks to be a real adult who gave up on their dreams. When was the last time I felt free in my internal playground? Every day of my life, bitches. I’m your anomaly, Prada copy-writer. But, point taken. Work sucks when you’re doing it for other people, and we’ve all had times when you feel caught and pinched and empty in our creative attempts. And now, we’ve all been grounded by our stupid parents for the last few months. Stuck in our rooms. Some by choice, some not. And if we’re allowed out right now, the second spike is coming and we’re all depressed about the limits we have to live under in order to reduce advancing death.

 ‘A dream-like, interior world is conjured through Douglas Irvine’s photography to match the external, magical manifestation on display in the clothing. A blur of florals and glittering visual embellishment, diaphanous drape and ecstatic movement belie the strict foundations for both the images and garments.’

 campaign collage

  So far, so wordy and detailed. A world is glimpsed. One with blurs but strict foundations. A real world made hazy. We have classic codes walking in a trepidatious vein. Miu Miu girl is testing out the limits of her horizons, playing with her identity through her clothes and thinking to herself, how much do I want to give away? What will I keep? But the text continues:

 ‘Wearing a clothing collection that splices the utilitarian with the formal, the everyday with the extravagant, delicate artisanal embellishment is contrasted with and applied to a notion of the sturdily homespun. Here, nineteenth century literary heroines, both fictional and actual, are channelled, the sources of teenage-girl bedroom revolutions in both style and substance, yet worn by a new generation of everyday heroines with all of their contrasting clothing choices.’

 We lose track here. Not sure this collection actually feels ‘artisanal’ or ‘sturdily homespun’. there’s the late 20-teens pop refrain of dark psychedelia’s fixation on moth-eaten fin de siècle grandness, the upending of 19th C avant-garde in the counter-culture’s looping democratisation. We have an eclecticism, a thriftiness, a carelessness with the past symptomatic of isolated children playing with a mish-mash of pieces born of hemmed-in theatrics.

 3 MIU PICS

 MORE – CAMPAIGN/POSES/FACES/DESCRIBE CLOTHES – here comes what night?. Colour, focus. Don’t really like the clothes, wouldn’t wear any of this tbh.

 CAMPAIGN PICS coll

  As for Marni’s Alice in Wonderland, I have languishing notes which seem as old and tired as the idea of 2019. I was practising twitter threadiness, and got as far as notes on Milan before the covid freeze set in my mind. I like mixed responses, it’s the only thing that feels fair, but with those Milan collections I couldn’t achieve any sort of resolution or clear point. I didn’t know how I felt anymore. I’m unresolved in how I feel about criticism. It should be functional, but not necessarily constructive, if I feel the need to tear something down, as a critic that is within my job description. I’ll write a proper bit on the perils of fashion criticism from a distance, but in short I feel that it’s unfair to criticise a designer’s work from afar, especially negatively, but that until the fashion community realises the value of a public culture of critique (criticism being the only process by which you can hope to form an art system), real critics engaged with honestly parsing the strengths and weaknesses of fashion practice in service of public health will have to criticise from afar. This will impact the quality of the work, but it is hoped the audience can accept the pinch of salt required of virtual critique of a virtual fashion experience. The subject of the criticism here isn’t the clothes. I’m not asking questions of fit, of quality, I’m asking whether this is good fashion communication, as a time-dependent media phenomenon.  And, yes, I know I’m late on this one. Temporal fashion stress must take a rain check at present.

 Marni –

“collaged from the beginning to the end—from macro to micro to fractal. It’s about putting together remnants.”

 cut velvet woven by hand in a factory in Venice on looms that were originally designed by Leonardo da Vinci—a vanishing, time-consuming craft that Risso understandably wants to “protect and exalt.”

 “Are we in a psychedelic world and we need to be more grounded, or are we in a caged world and we need to be freed by psychedelia?”

  THREE MARNI

 risso Quotes:

“Finding beauty in the leftovers,”

“There’s a beauty in the past. I was kind of upset lately, thinking about people on their phones -- what about these objects that take hours to make, like these Venetian tapestries?”.                          mosaic of the remnants.

new, conceptual territory,

remnants of the previous collections

“It’s a celebration of DIY, Alice in Wonderland, and it’s about her spirit, her searching and questioning,”

the Cheshire Cat’s “We’re all mad here” mantra, as he talked about mandalas and allowing time for ideas to grow.

“Her spirit is within each creature, always wondering and questioning,”

“Making this collection has been the strangest mystery,” he confided. “It’s almost as if it regenerated itself – recreated itself – like an insatiable mosaic.”

 THREE MARNI

  At their best they’re the insatiable fractal mosaic he speaks of – something that situates you betwixt density and freedom. Was patchy – moments of clarity, moments of aimlesslness.. Appreciate the fashion-as-curious-adventure methodology. Ties and openness and rotation were true to Marni.. Materials – twisted tradition meeting rational plain cottons hit the mark. Gold rings, like they’ve melted through from another dimension. They were scattered over the body, but I was left wanting to know more of this motif – what if it become structural, like a portal to another plane? Patchwork that doesn’t feel done in good faith. Like a trick. None of these shapes are done in the spirit of patchwork, like the wrong kind of luxury. Too much care is given to appearing careless, but a reach for dizzying angles in effect sidelines affect – it feels tidily resolved, and then mussed around at the end. I’m probably wrong on many fronts about the reality of their process. But what I’m feeling right now is that if all you’re aiming for is the ‘look’ of patched pieces rather that the ‘ethic’ or process of thrift, then you’ll just get trapped in an endless empty labyrinth of false choices. It’s not about the look, it’s about shiftinG your total parameters of design decision making going forward. Additive.

  I’m still figuring out how I feel about this. Both these collections suffer from a neat, pat resolution of the question of the deadstock aesthetic that avoids the hard work of engaging with the limitations of that mode of work. Where is the tension? Where is the sacrifice? The loss of freedom in thrift must be acknowledged. If you’re telling me a story about a lost girl in a crazy world that makes no sense, why do her questions of her physical environment feel so impersonal? Many designers are going to turn to patchworking, out of both necessity and fashion gameplaying. Each designer is going have to work their way to an individual conversation with the difficult questions of recycling while avoiding the traps of the easy way out. Both teams failed at this test, in these collections. Sustainability isn’t easy, or anywhere close to being properly engaged with by our establishment figures. (Viktor & Rolf are a good example of recycling feeling right and thought about and cared for).

 Viktor&Rolf samples

  I’m reading Lolita at the moment. (CAN YOU TELL?)  I’m not a good reader. (CAN YOU TELL?)  A.D.D., I guess. I get bored and drift off to fantasyland. But here’s a stab at some fancypants analysis: The far-off subject, Lolita herself, is overlooked by the narrator’s masturbatory myopia. Her exploration of her own girlhood/womanhood is reduced and flattened by her abuser who needs her to be something else, something thing-y. A two-dimensional being. The tension between predation and autonomy, her wounded rebellion and navigation of self are so distant in the book you can’t help but want to reach out to her, through her abuser’s hideous twisted lens. Humbert’s POV colours everything, Lolita isn’t permitted her own take, everything she does is ridiculous and gazed down upon, he feels he’s permitted to just take her, to prioritise his own long-abated lust without thought of the consequences to her sense of self.

 This vibe I’m analysing here, the bruised and fuzzy self-discovery of Miu Miu and the lost-play of Marni, kind of feels like it hasn’t really shrugged off the top-down, hidden, extractive gaze of the cornered, self-pitying male power player. Maybe the viewer is Humbert. Maybe I’m Humbert. Maybe you’re Lolita. Maybe vice versa. But he’s there, in the corner, or taking the picture. Someone’s always taking it in, and jealously building a crypto-fantasy version of the girl, even as our self-birthing adolescent is feeling towards a way to fight it off.

 campaign

 Spring 2020 was a fucking twisted, disorienting, stretched moment. Tough times for fashion practitioners, not just in terms of lost profits or mob moralising (pppeoppllle arree dyyinnnngggg howww daree you talkkkk aboutttt fashioonnnn) but in the nuts and bolts of fashion practice – if the role of the fashion designer is to collaborate with their wearers in plotting a path to the future, when a world-re-orienting catastrophe occurs, it rapidly recontextualises their attempts at constructing a scaffold around the unknown. The idea that the future can be planned for and known through schedules and aesthetic anticipation gets rumbled. The foundation of that building site got a bit cracked during this Spring’s quake. Mapped onto ongoing structural issues in, what I guess in this analogy is a renovation of our historic temporal orientation casino, basically fashion collapsed in its usual confidence along with the economy (economics being fashion with numbers and no fun so it’s respectably masc. vom). Who knows who’s going to go out of business. There may not be a Miu Miu or a Marni or whoever in the future. Names we take for granted are just going to die. That’s a loss for the art aspect. Cus these guys are creative, mad geniuses who deserve a healthy context for their vision. (OTOH: die, fashion industry, die! I dance in the glow of the flames of your destruction with gleeee). These two collections actually speak to me across the span of the last six months, which takes some doing. They succeeded in the criteria that we should actually apply to fashion practice: satnav for the social soul. As sense of protection from the twists of time. A hand to hold. Someone to talk to. And time is super twisty rn. Good job holding on as we fall through the looking glass, random Italians! Now, to work.

 COLLAGE

 Colours – piecework – slippery glistening rainbow lensflares – Marni, FR places himself as an agent of chaos, someone with a hidden explanation refusing to submit to logic and set ways, a spanner in the works of Alice’s complacency.

 Patchwork, rhizomatic? (????, what is that. Idk, just sounds funnnn), no beginning and end, things relating to one another in disjointed, flexible ways. FR gives is little hints at the instability that patching offers, the early looks in Miu are far too comfortable. In the cut, sheets are formed out of set shapes – traditional, in the spirit of that half-remembered literary heroine – but neat, very very neat. Happy patchwork . Not patchwork that’ll prompt you to any alternative engagement with your world. FR is poking holes, even burning them out with molten gold, playing with the limits of ‘traditional’ or easily molded pieces. There’s skirts that feature block pieces - an armhole, a curve that any dressmaker will recognise, but set elsewhere, surrounded by other pieces so that the shaping becomes as redundant as Alice’s desperate attempts to right her upside down world. That ordered, shaping impulse is pawed at in the Marni work, but indulged in by Miu Miu. Our Miu Miu heroine feels more like an only slightly misunderstood brat, but Marni’s Alice is strung out and barely even human anymore. I’m disappointed in both approaches, but Marni, as the radically abstract collection that’s pushing concept on us, is the one that actually fails in its aims. Mrs Prada & Co are aware of the limits of commercial offerings. They’re happy to speak when permitted, in the lulls between commerce. It’s pragmatic and unadventurous, romantic within set bounds. It’s a walk in the park, where Marni is a clumsy trip through an open manhole cover.

 COLLAGE

 I said at the beginning of this that if we’re only going to see more patchwork as a process we actually have to grapple with it, and there’s a risk at this point in fashion that the fashion people (c’est moi aussi, mfs) are going to go ‘oh, been there, done that, on to the next thing’ without ever actually engaging with it as a means of creating fashion. What does (BRANDNAME) recycling look like, what makes it (BRANDNAME) in a way that become part of a lexicon long term rather than another sticky-plaster? Patchworking is many things, but what are its fundamentals? It’s a way of forming textile surfaces that accepts that which is available. It’s humble and more concerned with ethics than end result. The small squares/triangles in traditional American quilting are ways to systematically optimise waste pieces and merge them with other pieces. This in its own turn creates more micro-waste, perhaps to be used as stuffing, but forcing scraps into legible grids is very strict and imperial, the grid being an easy way of organising a surface from above. Grids and precise geometries are more like things overlaid, not bubbling up from beneath. They’re simple and readily comprehensible. There’s other forms of merging irregular pieces: think of rag-rug like textiles, crocheting with strips, or applique. Certain aesthetic choices can be made when you’re actually working with the idea of recycling waste material, rather than looking for an end-result before you even started. A cut piece has an end but with patchwork it can become endless. There’s kind of something anti-hierarchical about it. Waste pieces formed out of negative space can relate to each other not in the sense of ‘this looks pretty’ but more in the sense of ‘spontaneity rules’.

 I’m realllly self-consciousness about existing in the purgatory between between fashion and theory. Theory thinking of itself as ‘too serious’ for fashion and fashion of itself ‘too fun’ for complex discussion (sidebar: can we stop talking about showstudio as if it is in any way innovative? I can’t watch those videos. I have classic fashion goldfishitis. Where is my colour and jazziness and silly nonsense. Why tf do fashion people think ‘oh, critique! must be unfashion. Must sit in room being boring with no cuts or editing. Here, watch a fucking zoom call, fuck your need for beauty.’ The motherfuckers are working against us. Hate, Hate, Hate, you fucking jerks). So, my difficulty lies in how to dodge the hierarchical perception of theorising, people assuming you’re talking down rather than across, when they’re often dyslexic or disinterested in this kind of stuff because they’ve been taught to think it’s ‘beyond’ them or it’s just some bullshit they’ve found boring/embarrassing/trauamatizing. There’s nothing wrong with finding something boring when it’s engaging in elitist and hierarchical perceptions of ‘intellctualismsm’ or ‘quality’. There’s so much work to do, so much rubble to excavate. I’m not writing about Deleuze & Guattari’s analyses of patchwork for a reason here: I haven’t read them. I attempted A Thousand Plateaus in undergrad, gave up, and since then have really struggled with this feeling of being caught between modes of being - visual/verbal/temporal. Fashion zonked, theory enraged. I have a deep respect for the communicative power of dress and fashion media, paired with immense frustration at the slight engagement with complexity in the culture. Theorizing can be colourful, can be fun, can be bright. Fashion doesn’t need to abandon these wonderful things in order to have some self-respect. In fact, its self-respect will only be assured when it learns to push forward towards aggravating, complex dialectics in its own styles of discourse that fashion people actually want to engage with. I expect at some point within the next decade I’ll find a way to develop my self-confidence in reading beyond wikipedia and want to return properly to the topic of quilting and patchwork in relation to rhizomes and abstract post-structural philosophy, but I’m not there yet. Maybe there’s nothing there in D&G, just hot air, or maybe fashion isn’t worthy of theorising. Both suck in various ways. I’m not confident enough in the theory realm to interact with any self-assurance in a way that computes in both worlds. I’m only just learning to piece myself back together after trying to work within fashion’s established methods and failing. I’m here slowly feeling my way towards engaging properly as a dedicated reader and a dedicated fashion practitioner. But the responsibility to push forward and make fashion practice sufficiently rigorous, self-reflexive, critical and engaged with other fields while playing to its own strengths as discipline that actually brings something to the table, without the solidarity of peers engaged in the same questions, it gets a bit disorienting sometimes.

[thehiddensemicolon]

Kacchako fanfic: New Prey Chapter 20

The seniors just finished the banquet dinner and now some wanted to go hit the dance floor. "Oh my geeshes guys! We should totally go dance now! Come on Kirishima!" Ashido said. (TBH I loved her in the recent BNHA manga, the brake dancing scene) "Yeah everyone come on! let's all do a Class dance mob " Kirishima said. Some of the others were hyped up and were lining up to request for songs from their DJ (Present Mic) "Tch no way am I doing stupid shit with them. Who would want to huh Ochako?" He said. With no reply. Better yet she wasn't even by him. He looked around until he saw her cheering on the idea of a class 1A dance. "Of fucking course she would be into shit like this." He sighed. The class was all debating on what they should do as a class. "Huh????? What is this? Class A thinks they are the better dancers than Class B? That's so funny I almost forgot to laugh? Hey Everyone! The A CLASS THINKS THERE BETTER THAN US? Maybe we should put them in their place and whip the smirks of their face!" Monoma said. Class A was just wondering why he thought they were on rival terms or why this was a sudden competition. "Whoa whoa bro calm down. We just want to show our manly dancing spirits as a whole class before we graduate. There doesn't have to be a competition." Kirishima said. "Right this shouldn't be a competition on who is the better class... THIS SHOULD BE A COMPETITION ON WHAT CLASS HAS THE MOST MANLINESS SPIRIT!" Tetsutetsu declared. The next thing you know all the classes began planning their dances. "Oh yeah! No quirks allowed!" Midnight said. The students wondered why the teachers suddenly claimed any interest in this. And now supposedly they were the judges. "How did this come into a competition. Isn't this supposed to be prom?" Momo said. "Ribbit. When it comes to this school, even something as normal as Prom will be different for us." Tsuyu said. "And then we should the running man when the song is almost done." Kaminari was rambling. The class took notes and eagerly agreed. Bakugou grabbed Ochakos hand signaling they should leave, but instead was tugged into the crowd by her. "What's the matter Katsuki? Scared you won't be the best dancer?" She muttered. She always knew how to push his ego. The next thing that happened was Bakugou taking over as leader and giving his own commands on what is to be used in the dance off. After about twenty mins. Some of the classes began doing their dance stunt with a song of their choice. (I will let you all as the readers imagine all the dancing and songs they chose) After laughing,tripping, and being dog piled on, the seniors had a good time with their competition. Present mic was jamming it up in the room with various different types of songs. The classes eventually got in the moment and joined together having fun. Kaminari, Sero, and Kirishima made a comment that Bakugou's dancing was lame (because they wanted mess with him) and he angrily showed them up by showing off a couple moves. They all wondered if there was anything this guy was bad at doing. Uraraka was dancing with her buddies Deku and Iida. She was twirling Iida and then they all goofed off randoming square dancing with each other. Ashido, Momo, Jirou, and Tsuyu tried to get Shouto and Tokoyami to loosen up and have fun dancing. Shouto was trying to mimic the girls dancing moves and ended up saying "Oh!" Whenever he replicated it. Aoyama twirled his way and posed so elegantly and sparkling in the middle of the group. Shouto tried to mimic Aoyama moves and the girls cheered for him. Jirou and present mic began having a debate on which song was better for slow dancing. Both were hard headed and eventually Aizawa ended the argument telling present mic that this is the students prom so they get to choose the songs. Jirou smirked with confidence. Along the way, Kirishima Kaminari and sero dragged Bakugou with Dekus group (who was still laughing and square dancing, despite the song choices.) Bakugou saw Uraraka dancing with Iida and then Deku (which ruled him up) he walked up to the back of Deku and reached out his arm to grab the nerds shoulder to get his attention. Uraraka saw this and immediately hooked Bakugou's arm with her own and made him apart of their square dancing thing they had going on. The boys joined up and they began switching partners. In which Bakugou was mad about and  secretly threatened the guys to not enjoy dancing with Uraraka or that he will explode them in the face In which Kaminari became Uraraka's new dance partner and forced a sad face when dancing with her. Then sero was next in line dancing with her and shut his eyes the entire time and ended up face planting on the floor. Kirishima was the dare devil and laughed and smiled when he started dancing with Uraraka. In response Bakugou said let's take this outside to Kirishima, but Iida said he wouldn't allow such an action (he overheard because he was Bakugou's current square dancing partner) Uraraka wanted to avoid any trouble and switched partners with Iida and became Bakugou's partner again. The song changed into a slow dancing song (the one Jirou won present mic over) The couples began to find their partners and head to the dance floor. Some people were off to the sides or were staring at other people (in hopes they could dance with them) Bakugou brought Uraraka to the middle of the dance floor (because they were the best so they had to be the center of attention) She hooked her hands on his shoulders and he gripped her waist. And slow danced to the song. They both looked at each other the entire time. "You look really handsome in a suit Katsuki. I hope to see you in them more often." Uraraka mentioned. "Psh wouldn't that be nice for you." He responded. Unsure on what to say, he decided to comment on her dress. "My shithead parents seem to be good at one thing, they made your dress look great on you. You should wear more often. It's a badass color." He said. "Right I love this dress. I will tell them thanks when I see them again." She said. "Oh and who said you are going to see them again?" He said. "Oh well your mom and I text every now and then. Am sure we will plan something soon." She giggled. "What you two text? And you enjoy it? Who in the fucking world can handle my mom." He grunts. "Well I do. Come on it's not like I won't be seeing them ever again. Remember we are still dating and I plan to be together. So of course I should get to know them silly. You should do the same, my parents will enjoy getting to know you. I know I did!" She smiled. He felt a sting hit his chest. He suddenly remembers what her dad said when he asked him for his daughters hand. The rejected answer that left his lips. Bakugou looked down. But quickly wipe the look off his face and pretended that nothing bothered him. "Hey what's wrong?" She asked. "Nothing." He said. She knew something was wrong. But chose to address this another time. She knew he wouldn't talk in front of people. "Well this was a fun night. I can't believe we are graduating. And so soon too! Next week is when we decide on the hero agency we want to work at or when we find out if any company wants us! Isn't that exciting!" She said. "Fuck yeah it is. After a couple years with those companies. Am going to start my own! And create the best hero agency ever!" Bakugou said. "Oh wow really? You want to start your own? I never knew that! Well I think that's an awesome idea! If anyone could do it, its you!" She said. Her words comforted him. She always said she believed in him. Made him feel like whatever happens to him, there is always someone that has his back. He gripped her tighter and she placed her head on his shoulders. "So I was thinking... after we graduate let's get an apartment together." She asked. He wasn't expecting that question. Apart of him keeps thinking about her dad. He gulped. He than remembered his promise to himself. That he wouldn't stop until her dad says yes. He was going to prove to him that he is the guy for her. "Yeah why the hell not. Let's do it." He said. "Yay! Am glad you agreed. I'll be able to have your cooking all the time now!" She smirked. "Psh. Whatever." He said. He started thinking of a plan to teach her how to cook. Cause he would be dammed if he was the only cook in the house. A/N I honestly enjoy it whenever a reader send me messages with suggestion. Or just to say hi. I don't bite. Feel free to post a review. Am not too familiar with Hero Agencies. What do you guys think? What hero agency do their join? Should they work or the same one? Or be in different agencies. Next Chapter: the students take an evaluation test to show up their skills to be recruited in agencies.